I am cutting a double slot dovetail for the desk I am building. How would you cut the two recesses to accept the dovetails? These are large, so a router bit won’t work. I was thinking of using a forstner bit to cut away a majority of the waste and then chisel the remaining. Thoughts?

I’m using a Fine Woodworking plan that says “make the sockets.”

-- "Man is the only animal which devours his own, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor." ~Thomas Jefferson

I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss a router. I have had good luck routing dovetail sockets with a 1/4” spiral bit. The big advantage with a router is the bottom of the cut will be uniform. Cut close to the line, and pare the rest with a sharp chisel. http://lumberjocks.com/pintodeluxe/blog/38791

-- Willie, Washington "If You Choose Not To Decide, You Still Have Made a Choice" - Rush

One thing that you can do is to chisel out the very top of the dovetail socket, say 1/8” deep. Make sure it the dovetail fits it nicely. Then you come back with a router with a pattern bit, and set it up so that the bearing rides on the area you have just chiseled out.

-- The quality of one's woodworking is directly related to the amount of flannel worn.

I watched the video, mds2. It’s pretty funny that his method he repented of in the first video is precisely the forstner method I thought I had dreamed up. I tried the dovetail saw/chisel method on a piece of scrap, and it worked just fine. I wouldn’t have thought of the multiple saw cuts.

I’ve only done half blind with a jig before, so this was kind of fun.

-- "Man is the only animal which devours his own, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor." ~Thomas Jefferson

If doing more than a few, figuring out a way to wasteit out with a router after sawing what you can of theedges may be worth the effort. If just doing a few,excavating it all with chisels is not too onerous.